Living Her Life
by Haripoons
Summary: Self-Insert. One day I woke up in a hospital to find that my mother had just named my infant self Hermione, and to top it off, I can't even be in a canon-compliant world. I'm living a fanfiction.
1. Chapter 1

My eyes open to white walls and a blue, plastic chair with a man sitting on it, looking exhausted. A nurse in a scratchy blue outfit grabs me and holds me in the air, "Congratulations, it's a girl," she says, smiling. The woman in the hospital bed smiles, her whole face lighting up. "Oh I knew it would be a girl, I just knew it." She turns towards the man on the chair, "Didn't I, Mark?"

"You were right, Emma," He agrees. I look at these two smiling, tired, adults, confused. Very confused. What the hell is happening?

"Hello Hermione," the woman breathes, looking at me.

My first thought is "Hermione, like the Hermione from the Harry Potter books?"

The next few months are a blur as I find myself a baby, unable to move and watched nearly twenty-four seven by a certain Mr. and Mrs. Granger. I wonder how I could go to sleep in my bed one night, a normal teenager, and wake up as a baby in a family I'm pretty sure only exists in a book. I often think my life is a dream and one day I'll wake up and everything will be back to normal. But every morning I wake up in the same pink crib, the same cloying smell of my pink blanket and stuffed green rabbit whom my parents have taken to calling "Bun-Bun." Gee, what an original name.

I often feel conflicted about the Grangers. I remember my old parents, mostly, but the memories are slightly fuzzy, and I feel like Emma and Mark are my real parents. It's an odd feeling to get accustomed to, though not nearly as odd as drinking breast milk and having my diaper changed. Going from being a seventeen year old girl to an infant with all her memories intact is certainly an . . . interesting experience.

As soon as I am old enough to come with Daddy to the library, age three in this case, the Granger family is apparently notorious for being smart, I toddle off to the history book section of the library and start pulling books off the shelves. Dad meanders over a bit later to find me engrossed in a history of the United States of America textbook that's meant for high school students and must be eight-hundred pages.

"Reading that book, Sweetheart?" He laughs, assuming, as any sane person would, that there's no way his three year old girl is doing anything other than looking through the pictures in the large textbook.

I refrain from rolling my eyes and take a moment to consider. Should I let him know how smart I am? I don't really want to be stuck in preschool for the next few years but I probably shouldn't reveal the true extent of my knowledge either.

"Dada I reading," I say, faux proudly, puffing up my chest and pointing to the book.

Dad chuckles, amused, "Really, Honey?" He asks, "How about you read this sentence then?" He's pointing to one of the easier sentences in the textbook. There aren't any words like "Imperialism" or "Turkish Treaty of 1856." Yes, I decide, this will do nicely to demonstrate my intelligence.

"Amewica was a pwace that was desiwable fow peopoo to cowonize in the fowteenth centuwy," I'm careful to mispronounce my R's, keeping to the speech patterns of a three year old. I move on to the next sentence and watch as Dad's eyes widen in realization that I'm actually correctly reading from the book.

"Good job, Honey," he praises me, eyes wide and excited. He's probably already thinking of the best way to show me off to his sister and her family. From what I've heard of his conversations with Mom, Anne Williams nee Granger has always lorded her higher IQ over him and I'm sure he wants nothing more than for me to be smarter than her little five year old boy, Jeffrey, who can barely read the word "and."

Over the next few years, after having been moved up to fourth grade at age five, I devour the library's history section and come to a few shocking realizations. Although being named Hermione Granger was certainly suspicious, it didn't guarantee that I'd magically been transported to Harry Potter Land, but as I look up more and more "unusual" events in newspapers from around Britain, a lot of unexplainable "accidents" are suggesting death eater activity. Of course, nothing could ever be as easy for me as JUST being born into a fictional world. I, apparently, haven't even been born into the real Harry Potter world, but some kind of fanfiction or spinoff version.

J.K. Rowling always kept pretty close to normal global history in the Harry Potter books, but in this world, the current U.S. president is named Carl Cann. I don't exactly remember learning about him in the history books back in middle school of my old life. Of course, a small detail like that isn't enough to guarantee I'm in an alternate Harry Potter reality instead of the canon version, but I've been looking up everything I can, and I'm pretty sure China and Korea never became a single country back in my old world.

The first time I do accidental magic, I turn my math teacher's hair bright pink in a private meeting with her during recess. The idiotic woman wants to discuss my lack of attention in algebra. As if it's not obvious that I'm a genius for my age level, or is she just blind to the fact that I'm eight years old and in her class for seventh graders? Well, maybe if I hadn't been learning pre-calculus in high school in my old life, and wasn't bored out of my mind, I' d be paying better attention. I feel myself getting progressively angrier until BAM. Ms. Anderson's hair is a lovely neon fuchsia. I snicker quietly, knowing she won't notice it until she looks in a mirror since it's pulled back in a tight ponytail.

The full implication of what I've done doesn't really hit me until I'm back at home. I freeze at the front door as I realize what my little "accident" means. I can do magic! I resist the urge to scream happily. Magic, real magic. I am Hermione Granger. I can do magic. I'm going to go to Hogwarts. Before this I'd thought "Maybe, just maybe I'll be able to do magic", but every time I'd tried anything remotely supernatural, it hadn't worked. I'd thought, that maybe in this alternate reality Hermione Granger couldn't do magic and I'd tried not to get my hopes us. But I did it! I did MAGIC!

After the excitement dies down, I come to another realization. Voldemort. If this was canon world it'd be easy. I'd wait till I'm of age, destroy the horcruxes, and keep Voldy from coming back to life, but here . . . Voldemort could still be alive for all I know and I won't find out until I'm contacted by the wizarding world. But then, then I'll have to wait three more years! Who knows how much information I could learn about this reality's wizarding world in that amount of time!

If only there was some sort of way for me to contact Hogwarts early . . .


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: To Goldenfightergirl, I don't want to find Harry yet in the story because I don't want to mess up the timeline before I know anything. For all I know, Harry doesn't even exist in this world. I want the opportunity to be exposed to histories of the wizard world before I take any drastic action.**

When I tell my mom and dad I want a pet owl, they look at me like I'm crazy. I have no guarantee that a non-magical and untrained owl will be as useful as the ones in the Harry Potter books, but I'm willing to try anyways. Who knows, maybe owls just have some sort of affinity for letter delivering. It takes a while (read two months) to convince my parents to let me have what mom calls the avian equivalent of a "furry, flying serial killer." Apparently Hermione's parents, I mean my parents, (God it's hard to stop thinking of us as two different people) always had a secret aversion to owls. After a long negotiation where I agree to try harder and school and stop tuning out my teachers (It's not my fault they're boring!) they agree to take me to an owl breeder.

Either I don't know as much about the world as I thought or the person who came up with this world is a little nuts, but I don't really see the appeal in breeding owls. I didn't even know it was possible. One painfully long car roundabout car trip to a practically uninhabited woodland area that doesn't have ANY FREAKING MAPS later, I have gained one fuzzy little owl whom I've decided, after much careful pondering, to name Mort Muncher, or Munchie for short. Never let it be said that I don't have a twisted sense of humor. I almost considered naming my new owl Nagini, but decided that was more of a snake name anyways.

I've been spending a fair amount of time working out the mechanics of my letter. I need to do enough to get a Hogwarts professor, preferably McGonagall, to come to my house, but I can't let them know the extent of my knowledge regarding the wizard world. Obviously, I can't address my letter to Minerva McGonagall, so I've been curious as to see whether "nice, magic, teacher-lady" will go to my intended recipient. Unfortunately, I'm still waiting for Munchie to grow a bit, seeing as the letter I want him to carry is roughly three times his size.

A few months later and Munchie is, finally, large enough to carry my letter. I keep trying to tie it to his foot but he flaps away and gives me the owl equivalent of a hiss each time I try. Damn it! If I was a mary-sue I wouldn't even be having this problem. I'd have popped into a world I knew everything about at age sixteen looking sexy and perfect and would have immediately met a major character and caused them to fall in love with me and betray all of their secrets while I easily defeated Voldemort. Stupid mary-sues, giving me unrealistic expectations for my Harry Potter-esque life.

After a few weeks of intensive training, I've figured out how to get Munchie to send, and accept, my letter. I think of Professor McGonagall, and by think I mean concentrate really, really hard, and try to force a miniscule amount of magic onto the letter. When I use magic I feel this really slight tingle across my skin and I've been trying to recreate the feeling. This way of letter-sending seems pretty farfetched, but assuming I'm living in some twisted fanfiction world, it makes sense, and I figure it can't hurt to try.

Finally, I feel the tingle, and all of a sudden, Munchie is docile and obedient with his foot sticking out. I attach the letter and open the window, watching as he flies off into the distance. I think back to my letter:

Dear Magic Lady,

Sometimes I dream about you and I turned my teacher's hair pink yesterday.

From,

Hermione Granger

It sounds bizarre but I am trying to sound like a young kid sending a letter without her parents' knowledge. I figure if I can pass myself off as being a really undeveloped and only slightly talented seer (read: Professor Trelawney), I'll be able to explain knowing certain unexplainable things and I'll be able to come into contact with the magical world.

A week of anticipation later, I hear a thump on the window. Poor Munchie has flown right into the glass of the window. I probably should have prepared for that. I sigh, whoever thought owls were intelligent is an idiot. I run out the door and find my owl lying, dazed, on the ground beneath my window, an official looking letter attached to his leg.

"Yes," I breathe, "It worked."

I open the letter and begin to read. It's my Hogwarts letter, yeehaw, with a small note attached from a certain Minerva McGonagall (damn I'm good at planning) that says the letter has been sent a bit earlier than expected and she'll drop by tomorrow to explain . . . certain things to my parents and I. I'm ecstatic.

The next day there's a knock on the door. My father pulls it open to reveal an older woman with in dark red robes with a glasses and a pointy hat.

"My name is Minerva McGonagall," she tells him, "I've come to have a conversation with your family about your daughter, Hermione."

I step out from behind my father, a wide smile on my face, I have to admit, I'm excited to finally be meeting one of the major canon characters. Professor McGonagall doesn't look exactly like the actress did in the movies though, nor how I'd originally imagined her. I wonder what dictates how people look in this world. I'd looked in the mirror a few times and noticed that I certainly never looked like an eleven year old Emma Watson. Too bad, she's really pretty.

My father is immediately defensive, "How do you know Hermione?"

I pat Dad on the leg reassuringly, "It's okay, Daddy," I say, with the most disturbingly innocent smile I've ever had. "I see the Magic Lady in my dreams and she's nice. I sent her a letter."

I'm probably acting a bit out of character from my established genius, but I don't want McGonagall to know just how smart I am quite yet.

It takes my parents a while to get used to the idea that magic exists, but after Professor McGonagall transfigures our couch into a full grown lion and turns into a cat herself, there's not much for them to say. McGonagall shows my parents the Hogwarts letter and explains about witches and wizards and how I'm set to attend the school but I seem to have discovered the magical world early due to my seer-like abilities.

The Professor's solution to this problem is for my parents to take me on day trips to integrate with wizarding families like the Weasleys. I'm certainly amenable to the idea, considering that Fred and George were some of my favorite characters from the books. Truthfully though, I'm not so sure about Ron. I don't think he's the devil like many fan fiction writers seem to, but I do think he's a defensive poor kid who feels like he's always living in his older brother's shadows. Then, it occurs to me, that if I am in a fan fiction world, Ron could very well be an evil brat if the creator/writer of this world hates his guts. Dumbledore could be evil and manipulative. Molly Weasley could be annoying and overbearing.

Before my fears overwhelm me, I realize that if this is a world written by a fanfiction writer, it seems to be a good one where characters aren't just one-dimensional. The other kids at school have many traits, just like real people, not like bad fanfiction characters. It's the same with my parents. At the moment, they aren't magic hating beasts but they also aren't the perfectly understanding and supportive without questions parents that they seem to be often portrayed as in fan fiction.

No sense thinking too much about it now, I decide, I'll have to wait until I meet the Weasleys. And despite my apprehension, I think I'm going to have a lot of fun messing with people (and saving the world from Voldemurtle too, of course. If I can manage it.)


End file.
